HOLYOKE — Ten months after the coronavirus tore through the Soldiers’ Home in Holyoke, the head of the state’s National Guard contingent testified before a legislative oversight committee that he never received a call for help from the facility when the disease took hold in March.
Maj. Gen. Gary W. Keefe, adjutant general of the Massachusetts National Guard and the new chairman of the Soldiers’ Home board of trustees, said he and 102 members of the guard arrived at the home late that month, when veterans began dying at an alarming rate, encountering carnage many staff have since recounted to a litany of investigators.
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Sen. John Velis, D-Westfield, a committee member and combat veteran who has emerged as an advocate for the facility and families of veterans, challenged Sudders on the hierarchy that includes the Department of Veterans Services.
He pointed to a blistering report commissioned by Baker and authored by Boston attorney Mark Pearlstein that heaped blame for the death toll on upper management at the Soldiers’ Home and middle management for the state.
“Does it make sense to have that added layer of bureaucracy?” Velis asked Sudders. “The more people you have in that chain of command, the more instances of potential breakdown.”
Sudders stood behind the chain of command and highlighted the hasty reforms the state is pursuing, including a “refresh” of the Holyoke facility, staffing changes and a sprint toward a new, state-of-the-art home with a $300 million price tag.
Some of Sudders’ own testimony suggested she was unfamiliar with the culture at the Holyoke Soldiers’ Home until the crisis, including haphazard staffing.
“I was frankly stunned that there wasn’t a permanent schedule at the home,” Sudders testified, referring to staffing plans, though she maintained the levels were “adequate.”
Velis suggested Walsh’s call for help may have gotten lost in the tangled chain of command. In response to a request for comment, a spokeswoman for Sudders referred to a page in the Pearlstein report that concluded the call for the National Guard came to a halt with former Veterans’ Services Secretary Francisco Urena, whom Walsh emailed directly. Two days later, the cavalry arrived when other state leaders got wind of the magnitude of the crisis, the report says.